Facebook’s Like button alternatives launching ‘in the next few weeks’

Facebook has been wanting to replace the Like button for a few years now, and that idea might soon come into fruition. Back in October 2015, the social network’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg gave us a sneak peek at what we could expect from Facebook’s Like button alternatives, called Reactions. Reactions can be thought of as a more expressive Like button, where users will get to express their exact feelings from a number of different emotions such as love, awe, humor, sadness and more. Facebook has been testing Reactions for a few months now, and it looks like they’ll soon roll out to users in the United States. According to what the company tells Bloomberg, we can expect to see a full rollout “in the next few weeks.”

The social network doesn’t have plans to rush into things, and for good reason. Facebook’s Like button has been a very big tool in the way users express themselves on the internet, and the company didn’t exactly want to mess that up. Many folks over the years have been requesting a Dislike button to be added to each Facebook post, but Zuckerberg claimed that would make things too negative. Also, adding a Dislike button would be quite reminiscent of the way Reddit works, almost acting on an upvote/downvote structure. This isn’t ideal for obvious reasons, which is why the Facebook team created Reactions.

“We roll things out very carefully,” says Chris Cox, the social network’s chief product officer. “And that comes from a lot of lessons learned.” Cox says the data he has looks promising, and that users will likely accept Reactions with open arms.